I’ve never lived completely apart from a homeless person. I think I’ve related before how I grew up. It’s wrong for me to not talk about it more often. I’ve always lived either in homes for homeless people or in direct proximity to their daily activities. Living in community is, for me, living in and with poverty. I consider it a distinct privilege. If that sounds crazy ask me about it. Surfing around this morning I came upon a blog by Kevin Barbieux, a homeless man living in Nashville Tennessee. His blogs have been up for years and he’s received some national attention for them, notably in Salon.comI consider it particularly unfortunate that I am not as involved with the homeless as I was at one time. I sit in this little office cubicle and stare at a computer. I see them panhandling up and down my street outside my window. Sometimes I stop to talk but not as often as I’d like. I miss the daily interaction of working in the homeless shelter. I miss the stories and conversation. I miss being part of so many lives over a given period of time. Forgive my little sentimental rant. There’s little that is sentimental about being homeless. I recently argued perfusely with a friend here who grew up very sheltered but is now enamored by the thought of hitch-hiking and squatting, and attending the hobo gathering. I must have sounded like a mother hen when I described getting caught on an express freight train or caught in the freezing rain without shelter or having nowhere to take a piss for hours.

A Desperate Kind of Faithful

Look at the feet. A broken bottle of incense lies on the floor. She lies there weeping and kissing the Son of God. She mops her tears with her hair. Some think its disgusting. His money man is sickened by the waste. The Son of God says "When you're forgiven much you love much." This humiliating, messy, desperate attempt at kindness is my kind of story. It illustrates the only kind of faith that fits me.